Queen of Babble (19 page)

“I wanted to know if they’ve got any diet Coke,” I say.

Dominique makes a face. “Of course not. Why would you want to put those kinds of terrible chemicals in your body?”

Because they’re delicious,I want to say. But instead I say, “Oh. Okay. Then…nothing.”

Dominique snaps something at Agnès, who nods, leaps up from her towel, stuffs her feet into a pair of rubber clogs—which seem like the appropriate footwear for walking through gravel and grass. WAY

more appropriate than suede Manolos—grabs her sarong, and takes off for the house.

“Wow,” I say. “She’s so nice.”

“She’ssupposed to do what you say. She’s thehelp, ” Dominique says.

I look over at Shari. “Um…but aren’t we, too? The help, I mean?”

“But you aren’t expected to fetch and carry for people,” Dominique says. “And you mustn’tvous her.”

“I’m sorry.” I shake my head. “I mustn’twhat ?”

“Youvous ’d her,” Dominique says. “When you tried to speak French to her just now. That isn’t proper.

She’s younger than you, and she’s a servant. You shouldtu her—the informal version ofyou—tu as opposed tovous . You’ll give her airs above her station. Not that she doesn’t already suffer from them—I don’t actually think it’s appropriate for her to be using the pool during her time off. But Jean-Luc said it was all right, so now there’s no getting rid of her.”

I sit there gaping at her some more, completely unable to believe the words that have just come out of Dominique’s mouth. Shari, for her part, is actually covering her face with her book, she’s trying so hard not to let it show how much she’s laughing.

As if Dominique would even notice. Not when she’s busy doing what she does next, which is say, “It’s so hot…”

Which, actually, it is. It’s broiling out. In fact, before Dominique started in on thatvous -versus-tuthing, I’d been thinking about taking a plunge into that clear blue water shimmering so tantalizingly in front of us…

But then Dominique does me one better by suddenly sitting up, undoing her bikini top, flipping it over the back of her chaise longue, then stretching and saying, “Ah. That’s better.”

The year 1848 (aptly nicknamed the Year of Revolutions) saw many peasant uprisings throughout Europe and the fall of the monarchy in France, as well as the potato famine in Ireland, and fashion responded to the unrest by requiring women to look as covered up as possible, with “poke” bonnets and skirts that trailed filthily to the floor declared the season’s “must-haves.”

This was the age of Jane Eyre, whom we all remember refused to accept Mr. Rochester’s generous offer to make over her wardrobe, preferring merino wool to the silk organzas he ordered for her. If only she’d had Melania Trump to set her straight on this wrongheaded attitude toward fashion.

History of Fashion

SENIOR THESIS BY ELIZABETH NICHOLS

14

Never to talk about ourselves is a very noble piece of hypocrisy.

—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900),

German philosopher, classical scholar, and critic

And okay. Iknow this is Europe and people here are much more laid-back about their bodies and nudity than we are (except that Dominique isn’t European. She’s Canadian. Which I guess is sort of like European. But still).

It’s just very hard to sit and talk to someone whose bare nipples are sort of…pointingat you.

And Shari’s no help at all. She’s keeping her gaze resolutely on the pages of the book she’s reading.

Though I notice she’s not actuallyturning any of those pages.

I realize there’s nothing I can do except try to act normal. I mean, it’s not like I’m not used to seeing bare-chested women, considering the gang showers back in McCracken Hall.

Still. Iknew all those girls.

Plus, Dominique’s knockers are—how can I put this?—a bit more suspiciously perky than even Brianna Dunleavy’s.

And Brianna worked part-time at Bare Assets Cocktail Lounge.

“So,” I say, casually, “have you mentioned all these ideas you have for, um, improving Mirac to Luke?”

Because I can’t help wondering whathe thinks of Dominique’s plans.

“Of course,” Dominique says, lifting a hand to slick back her long blond hair. “And to his father as well.

But the old man is only interested in one thing. His wine. So until he dies…” Dominique gives a metaphoric shrug.

“Luke’s waiting for his father to die before turning this place into a Hyatt Regency?” I ask, my voice cracking a little in my astonishment. Because I simply can’t believe the Luke I met yesterday would ever do such a thing.

“A Hyatt?” Dominique looks scandalized. “I told you, it will be five-star luxury accommodation, not part of a cheap American hotel chain. And no, Jean-Luc is not entirely enthusiastic about my plans. Yet. For one thing because he would have to move to France full-time to see them implemented, and he isn’t interested in giving up his job at Lazard Frères. Although I’ve told him it would be a simple thing to transfer to their Paris offices. Then we could—”

“We?” I’m on the word like Grandma on a can of Bud. “You two are getting married?”

“Well, certainly,” Dominique says. “Someday.”

It’s ridiculous that this statement sends a shaft of pain through my heart. I barely know him. I only met him yesterday.

But then I’m the same girl who traveled all the way to England to see a guy I had only spent twenty-four hours with three months earlier.

And look howthat turned out.

“Oh,” Shari finally pipes up, “you and Luke are engaged? That’s funny, Chaz never mentioned that to me. I’d have thought Luke would have told him.”

“Well, nothing so formal as an engagement,” Dominique says with obvious reluctance. “Who even gets engaged anymore? It’s so old-fashioned. Today’s couples, they form partnerships, not marriages. It’s all about combining incomes and investing in a shared future. And I knew, from the first moment I saw Mirac, that this is a future I wanted to invest in.”

I blink at her. Today’s couples form partnerships, not marriages? They combine incomes and invest in a shared future?

And what’s this aboutfrom the first moment I saw Mirac ? Doesn’t she meanfrom the first moment I saw Jean-Luc ?

“Itis a beautiful place,” Shari says, turning a page of her book that I know she hasn’t read. “Why do you think it is that Luke doesn’t want to move to Paris?”

“Because Jean-Luc doesn’t know what he wants,” Dominique says with a frustrated sigh.

“Does any man?” Shari asks mildly. And I can tell, from her tone, that she is highly amused by the conversation.

“Maybe he doesn’t want to be that far away from you,” I offer—very generously, in my opinion, considering my little crush on her boyfriend. Since that’s all it is. Just a crush. Really.

Dominique turns her head to look at me. “I have offered to transfer to Paris with him,” she says tonelessly.

“Oh,” I say. “Well. His mom lives in Houston, right? Maybe he doesn’t want to leave her.”

“That’s not it,” Dominique says. “It’s that if he puts in a request to transfer to Paris and it goes through, he’ll have to go. And then he’ll be stuck there. And there’ll be no chance for him ever to pursue the career he really wants.”

“What’s the career he really wants?” I ask.

“He wants,” Dominique says, picking up the bottle of water she has by her chaise longue and raising it to her lips, then swallowing, “to be a doctor.”

“A doctor?” I’m thrilled. I can’t believe Luke didn’t mention this on the train when I said all those bad things about investment bankers. “Really? But that’s so great. I mean, doctors…they heal people.”

Dominique looks at me as if I’ve just said the most obvious thing in the world. Which, of course, I have.

But she obviously hasn’t figured out that I routinely say the first thing that pops into my head. Seriously.

It’s like a disease.

“What I mean is,” I hasten to add, “doctors are so important. You know. To society. Because without them, we’d all…be a lot sicker.”

I look over at her to see what she thinks of this stroke of deductive brilliance on my part. Dominique has leaned up on her elbows—though the movement, mysteriously enough, did not cause her breasts to move at all—to look past me, over at Shari.

“Your friend,” she says to Shari, “talks very much.”

“Yes,” Shari says. “Lizzie does have a tendency to do that.”

“I’m sorry,” I say, feeling myself blush. But it’s not like I’m going to shut up. Because I physicallycan’t.

“But why doesn’t Luke go to medical school? I mean, if that’s what he wants to do? Because it can’t be that doctors don’t make enough money.” The Luke I know—the one who let me, a total stranger, cry on his shoulder on that train yesterday—and shared his nuts with me—would never choose a career based on what kind of salary he might earn in said career.

I mean, would he?

No. No way. Hugo instead of Hugo Boss! Come on! That is the choice of a man who prefers personal comfort over style…

“Is it the cost of medical school?” I ask. “Because surely Luke’s parents would support him while he was in school. Have you thought of talking about it to Luke’s mom and dad?”

Dominique’s expression changes from one of mild disgust—with me, apparently—to one of horror.

“Why would I do that?” Dominique looks completely perplexed. “I want Luke to transfer to Paris with me and work at Lazard Frères so that he and I can turn this place into a five-star hotel, turn over a considerable profit, and come here on weekends. I don’t want to be a doctor’s wife and continue to live inTexas. Is that so hard to understand?”

I blink at her. “Um,” I say, “no.”

But inwardly, I’m thinking,Wow. This is one lady who knows what she wants. I bet SHE wouldn’t have any reservations about moving to New York City with no degree, no job, and no place to stay already lined up.

In fact, I bet she’d EAT New York City.

It’s at this point Agnès returns from the kitchen, holding a plate of snacks.

“Voilà,”she says to me, looking extremely pleased with herself as she hands me the creation she’s prepared for me.

Which appears to be half a French baguette, sliced down the middle and stuffed with—

“Hershey bar!” Agnès cries, excited to be using the only English words she apparently knows.

I have just been handed a Hershey bar sandwich.

Agnès holds out the plate to Shari, who takes one look and says, “No thank you.”

Shrugging, Agnès then offers the plate to Dominique. The teenager doesn’t appear the least shocked that her boss’s girlfriend is half naked, proving that French people of all ages are way cooler about nudity than I am.

Dominique takes one look at the sandwich on the platter in front of her, shudders, and says,“Mon Dieu.

Non.”

Well, okay. Maybe she wouldn’t eat New York City after all. Too fattening.

Agnès shrugs again, takes her own chocolate sandwich off the plate, sinks back down onto her chaise longue, and digs in. Crispy bits of crust fall all over the front of her bathing suit as she takes her first bite.

Chewing, she gives me a chocolaty smile.

“C’est bon, ça,”she says, indicating the sandwich.

That much is obvious. The real question, of course, is how could it not be good?

Also, how can I say no to such a thoughtful and lovingly prepared snack? I don’t want to hurt the girl’s feelings.

There’s really only one thing I can do, of course. And so I do it.

And it is, without a doubt, the best sandwich I have ever eaten.

But it’s the kind of sandwich I can tell that Dominique—if she were to sink her business-oriented claws into this place—would outlaw immediately! Women recovering from lipo don’t want to be offered Hershey bar and baguette sandwiches! People on a corporate retreat can’t be served candy bars! I can practically see Dominique thinking this, even as she lifts a bottle of sunscreen and resolutely sprays her chest with it.

Agnès, and her Hershey bar sandwiches, will soon be a thing of the past if Dominique has her way with the running of Mirac.

Unless, of course, someone stops her.

“Ladies.”

I nearly choke on the huge bite of chocolate bar sandwich I’ve just taken. That’s because Luke and Chaz have just shown up at the far end of the pool, looking sweaty and dirt-smeared from their morning spent hacking at the underbrush along the driveway.

“Salut,”Dominique says, lifting a darkly tanned arm to wave at them. Her breasts, I notice, don’t move at all as she does this. It is a miracle of gravity.

“Hello, boys,” Shari says.

I don’t say anything for once, because I’m still too busy trying to swallow.

“Are you girls having a nice time?” Chaz wants to know. He is grinning, and I know why: half-naked Dominique. It’s hard to miss the amused glance he throws Shari, who only says, mildly, “Oh, we’re having adandy time. You?”

“Dandy,” Chaz replied. “Thought we’d go for a swim to cool off a little.” Even as he says it, he’s peeling off his shirt.

One thing I’ll say about Chaz. He may have a master’s in philosophy, but he’s got the body of a physical trainer.

But Luke—I’m able to note all too clearly when he, too, pulls off his shirt a second later—is an even more spectacular example of athletic masculinity than Chaz. There’s not an ounce of body fat on his tanned, well-muscled body, and his dark chest hair, while not copious, still forms a very distinct arrow that seems to point directly down to his…

SPLASH! Both guys leap into the sparkling water, not bothering to drop their shorts first, robbing me of the pleasure of seeing just what that trail of hair from Luke’s chest down into his waistband leads to.

“Christ, that feels good,” Chaz says when he surfaces. “Shar, get in here.”

“Your wish is my command, master,” Shari says. She lays down her book, stands up, and jumps. Some of the spray from the splash she makes gets on Dominique, who flicks it off.

“Dominique,” Luke calls from where he surfaces at the deep end. “Come on in. The water’s great.”

Dominique prattles something in French that I don’t completely catch, although the wordcheveux is mentioned several times. I try to remember ifcheveux means hair or horses. Somehow I don’t think Dominique is saying that she doesn’t want to get her horses wet.